Successful Weight Management Research Articles

Weight Control Behaviors of Low-Income, African American Women

Obesity is extremely common among African American women, and many women express interest in losing weight. To better understand current weight management practices in this population, this study measured behaviors and attitudes believed important to successful weight management. Data were obtained via telephone survey. The study involved 155 low-income African American women aged 30 to 69 identified through an urban primary care clinic. Results were compared between those women currently trying to lose weight (n = 80) and those who were not (n = 75). Those women trying to lose weight were more likely to engage in goal setting and dieting strategies categorized as planning and preparation, communication about diet, and cognitive strategies. Among those currently trying to lose weight, considerable room for improvement in the degree to which the women used the various strategies remained. Public health communications and health care provider interactions may need to deliver a broader, stronger message about healthy and successful weight management for this population.

The dietetic treatment of obesity

AbstractObesity has a direct, proportional link to morbidity and mortality, and despite the proven medical benefits of weight loss treatment failure rates are high. Historical approaches to weight management within the health service have focused solely on dietary issues. It is now widely accepted that dietary advice given in isolation is ineffective in inducing and sustaining significant weight loss. Obesity is a complex, multifactorial disease and any successful weight management programme should provide tailored dietary advice and facilitate permanent behavioural and lifestyle change. In addition, realistic goals (10% body weight loss) should be recommended. Exercise and physical activity suggested should be geared to individual capabilities. This article addresses how dietitians are treating obesity and what factors other than traditional diet sheets are essential components of a weight management programme. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Regulation of lipid mobilization and oxidation during exercise in obesity.

Regulation of lipid mobilization and oxidation during exercise in obesity. Exerc. Sport Sci. Rev. Vol. 29, No. 1, pp 42-46, 2001. Obesity is associated with metabolic disorders that may be related to alterations in lipid mobilization and oxidation. Although exercise is essential for successful weight management, the regulation of fatty acid metabolism during exercise in obesity is unclear. This review discusses factors that regulate fat metabolism during exercise and the effects of endurance training on these responses.

Pharmacist Counseling on Nutrition and Physical Activity— Part 2 of 2: Helping Patients Make Changes

Objective: To compare a meal replacement (MR) program with a conventional reduced-calorie diet (RCD) for weight management using the pharmacy as the setting and the pharmacist as the point of contact for dietary advice. Design: Randomized, controlled, open- label trial. Setting: Travis Pharmacy in Shenandoah, Iowa. Patients: Ninety-five patients from southwestern Iowa and southeastern Nebraska were enrolled, of whom 88 were considered eligible for comparison (by continuing through week 2 of the study). Intervention: Patients were randomized to an MR plan or a traditional RCD plan. Patients were followed for a 3-month period of active weight loss and a 10-week period of weight maintenance. Patients returned every 3 weeks for follow-up with the pharmacist, for a total of 13 visits. Main Outcome Measure: Weight changes. Results: During the active weight loss phase, the MR (n = 45) and RCD (n = 43) groups lost a significant amount of weight, although no significant difference was found between the groups (mean ± standard error = 4.90 ± 0.30 kg MR versus 4.30 ± 0.30 kg RCD; P = .16). In the weight maintenance phase, the MR group lost 0.70 ± 0.40 kg and the RCD group lost 0.90 ± 0.40 kg (P = .60). Significant improvements were observed in waist circumference, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, and triglyceride levels. No significant changes were seen in high-density lipoprotein cholesterol or low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels in either group. Conclusion: Successful weight management can be achieved in a pharmacy setting. Both MR and RCD programs were effective.

Why should obesity be managed? The obese individual's perspective.

Weight loss can be achieved using a variety of different methods, alone or in combination, including energy restricted diets, drug treatment and surgical intervention. The difficulty is maintaining weight loss over a prolonged period. Physicians, dietitians and nurses are often pessimistic about their ability to manage obesity. Such negative attitudes, combined with the erroneous belief that obesity is not a serious medical condition, have adversely affected the level of care received by obese patients. Despite this, the family doctor is often approached for help with weight control. Obese patients are generally well informed about diet and weight issues, and are in a good position to critically assess the weight loss advice given by their doctor. The perception of such advice formed part of a questionnaire completed by obese people (346 female/24 male) who successfully reduced their weight while attending a weight loss group. Eighty per cent had previously been advised by their doctor to lose weight, but guidance on how to do this was generally judged to be poor. Only 22% of subjects received positive advice, although 23% of subjects reported that their doctor's advice was indirectly responsible for their weight loss. Patients derived evident health benefits from their weight loss and were generally given a positive response on returning to their doctor. To help patients lose weight, doctors must realise that obesity is a serious chronic medical condition. Ongoing help and support from doctors and other healthcare professionals is a key element in successful long-term weight management.

Diet, exercise and behavioural intervention: the nonpharmacological approach.

Behaviour is an important factor in both the aetiology and treatment of obesity. Successful long-term weight management ultimately depends on the ability of patients to change their behaviour patterns, particularly with regard to diet and exercise. Many patients find such changes extremely difficult to initiate and maintain. The failure to properly address behavioural modification is part of the reason why so many weight loss programmes cannot produce long-term weight loss, even though initial weight loss is often achieved with relative ease. Four examples of lifestyle changes are discussed in this paper: exercise; relapse prevention; the concept of a reasonable weight; and attribution theory. Behavioural therapy should be an integral part of a multifaceted approach for managing obesity and associated conditions, such as type II (non-insulin-dependent) diabetes.

A Biomedical and Feminist Perspective on Women's Experiences with Weight Management

Weight concerns and dieting have become so normative for U.S. women that weight is the lens through which experience is viewed. The obsession with weight and dieting among women is considered by feminists to be one result of the oppression by women resulting from questionable weight standards and weight control programs that foster a view of overweight as a sign of addiction and lack of control. Feminist critique is used to deconstruct both the literature related to weight standards and health and the research on weight loss/weight management. Feminist and ethnographic methods are used to describe successful and unsuccessful experiences with weight management of 20 Euro-American women who had participated in a 1985 weight study and agreed to be reinterviewed. Success at weight management was examined from a biomedical perspective using Body Mass Index (BMI) norms and from a feminist perspective using participants' subjective definitions of success. Based upon BMI, only 8 members of the study group were defined as successful, whereas based upon the women's perspectives, 11 members were successful. Participants' definitions of successful weight management were divergent from biomedical definitions and could be categorized into three perspectives: biomedical, reframed normal weight, and holistic. Women who ascribed to the biomedical definition of success embodied the cultural ideal of thinness by adhering to an underweight weight norm. Participants using the reframed normal weight definition of success rejected biomedical weight norms and created their own weight norms. The holistic perspective on success involved the use of a broader, health-focused definition of successful weight management and offers some directions for revising current health promotion care relative to weight.

The problem of obesity: fundamental concepts of energy metabolism gone awry.

The growing prevalence and complex issues related to obesity continue to draw the interest and concern of health researchers and practitioners. This review summarizes pertinent background information on the multiple factors involved in the causes of obesity. Factors such as percentage of body fat, upper- vs. lower-body obesity, family history, past dieting history, and underlying medical conditions should be assessed on an individual basis and applied in the development of successful weight-reducing strategies. The recommended approach to nonpharmacologic intervention for weight loss is to first educate individuals about fat storage and energy balance and then focus on the development of positive behavioral skills such as wise food selections, favorable eating patterns, and regular physical activity. Although preventive measures such as positive eating patterns and exercise habits are ideally acquired in childhood and adolescence, successful weight management can still be achieved in adulthood. The information presented in the following sections provides clinicians with essential material to assist individuals in developing realistic goals at the outset of a weight-control program.

Prediction of successful weight management from personality and demographic data.

The equivocal results of research on weight-management may reflect a failure to consider subject variables. This study evaluated the utility of using personality and demographic data as predictors of weight loss, weight maintenance, and drop-outs in two weight-management programs, behavioral and behavioral with the addition of hypnosis. Although significant prediction occurred, the variables related to weight loss were different from those related to weight maintenance and were specific to the treatment employed. A different subset of variables significantly discriminated drop-outs from those who completed the treatments. Data suggest a multidimensional approach can be used to predict success effectively in a weight program, provided consideration is given to the specific treatment.